Aldo & Risa
by planet p
Summary: AU; in which Kyle isn't dead, and is a detective with the police. Contains slash, swearing and other assorted adult themes. Kyle/Lolly, Kyle/Lin, Kyle/Alex


**Aldo + Risa** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.

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**First posted at AdultFanFiction.**

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The bus bustled with activity and sound. Outwardly, Kyle Harper was oblivious, but inwardly, he took notice of every bump, every cry, the angry child three rows in front, kicking the wheel of her toddler sibling's pram, thinking maybe it will move, maybe it won't.

He resisted the urge to call out to her, admonish her – she wouldn't like it if it _did_ move, and her sibling was hurt – and focussed his attention on the tanned woman seated beside him, partner Lolly Corelli, posing as his girlfriend, Risa.

He brushed his hand across the searing vinyl of the too-wide patch of seat between them and brought his hand up to rest comfortably on her bare thigh, all of which went ignored by his partner, but really meant _If you've a problem with the distance between girlfriend and boyfriend, why don't _you_ solve it then?_

Hesitant, he played with one of the hems of her black short shorts – flush with her skin – for a long moment, and tried to relax, to breathe comfortably, in the broiling heat inside the crowded bus – a failed venture, even with all of the functional upper windows pushed open, so that the bus had suddenly grown two rows of stubby, grubby-but-mostly-invisible wings – and felt beads of sweat form in his palm and across Lolly/Risa's thigh where their skin touched, as though burned, and, in retaliation, their skin had began to weep the way ill-tended wounds do.

Hot wind spiralled into the bus through the open windows, smelling of tar and exhaust fumes, proving that the temperature was not much better – there was no reprieve to be found – outside the bus.

The sweltering heat made him tired and irritable, his thoughts sluggish, armies of invisible bugs and ticklish things alive against his skin, uncomfortable in the small of his back, the back of his ankle.

He continued playing with the hem of Risa's short shorts – surely an annoying pursuit – and wondered how fast she could un-superglue herself from the vinyl seat and land a punch somewhere unpleasant and potentially very painful.

Outside, they passed rundown shopfronts sporting smashed glass and murky brown packing tape, grocery stores covered in graffiti and gang tags, tattoo parlours and pawn shops, and souvenir shops selling knifes and other goodies representative of real human goodness and kindness, a sophisticated breath-and-blood moral compass of the hardships of life in any number of similar neighbourhoods.

At the front of the bus, a kid stood up and reached up on tiptoes and screamed obscenities out of the nearest upper window, and, encouraged, several of his friends followed suit.

Across the aisle from the kids, a woman lit up a cigarette, despite the faded No Smoking sign tacked to the front interior of the bus above the windshield.

Out on the street, the kids received obscenities back. An opened can of soda hit the window and sprayed sticky sugary substance across the window, followed by an orange, for which the thrower received a clip across the back of the head from an the elder of the group, who showed her middle finger to the kids on the bus and ordered her group off, bellowing after the kid who'd taken chase after the bus.

Kyle shut out all of this noise – just for a moment – and glanced seriously at Risa, whose brown eyes were fixed dead ahead of her. _Ah, heck it!_ he thought recklessly, and slid his hand into the curve of her thigh, where her skin was hotter, and slick with trapped sweat, and felt as the muscles underneath his fingers tightened – a subconscious sign of discomfort – a fraction of a second before Risa's hand flew to his wrist, and gripped it painfully, putting a stop to any progress he had been making with his hand.

He lifted his eyes and returned his gaze to her face, suddenly turned to him, brown eyes piercing his skin with their intensity – _Don't go there!_ they growled – and he just pushed his hand further along the length of her leg, across fabric and involuntarily shivering skin.

He let his eyes wander back to her leg, glancing with mock disdain and amusement at her hand on his wrist, and his hand on her leg. "Just say no," he breathed, whisper-quiet, careless to whether his voice was lost among the humdrum hubbub of the crowded bus and grumbling road.

The jolt in his stomach told him that he'd gone far enough, but he pushed that away too, and shimmied his hand the short distance along Risa's leg, her painful grip encircling his wrist ever-evident, to the position he had been aiming for, between her legs.

Risa moaned, but couldn't seem to get her tongue around the word. "Nnnn…"

"Just say it!" he teased in a low voice, suddenly wishing he could slap himself hard across the mouth, put some blood in his mouth.

Risa sucked in a deep breath, fully intending on utilising the use of both obscenities and a raised voice, much as the kids at the front of the bus had earlier, of maybe cursing his mother, or unborn daughter, and gave a sharp, hitching intake of breath as he applied a little pressure to the spot between her legs.

It was massively, horribly unfair, but Kyle didn't care.

"A-Aldo," she stammered the false name, breathless, yet somehow angered at the same time.

Kyle smiled and released his hold on her and felt her hand slide from his wrist, and dipped his hand into the waist of her short shorts.

"Nnn… Pl…eaaaase… Ona… buuuusssss," Risa moaned.

"I hadn't noticed," Kyle breathed, nonchalant, and applied some friction between his hand and the fabric of the tiny underwear she wore beneath the short shorts.

"Haaa…" she moaned, tightening and loosening her fists uselessly on the vinyl seat beside her legs, and hurriedly crossed her legs.

Kyle caught his surprise before it showed on his face, Risa was still watching him, after all, and pressed his hand tighter against the space between her legs. The bus hit a rut, or a hole, and he frowned in annoyance.

"Haa… yyyy… ooo!" Risa moaned.

"What's that, babe?" he asked, feigning ignorance, with a hint of amusement.

Risa's eyes finally left his own and rolled in her head as her eyelids lowered over them, and she groaned, tightening her legs around his hand and the insistent rocking/rubbing friction it was providing, and gritted her teeth when he scraped his fingers across a delicate spot.

Another bump in the road, her teeth slipped and gnashed against her bottom lip, drawing a spot of blood.

She sucked in a breath, blood backing up, flowing up over her lip and into her mouth, staining her teeth and tongue with the red taste. "Kklll… yyyyoooooo… hhaaarr," she promised, in a sudden expiration of breath.

"Honey?" Kyle mock guessed, well aware that Risa meant to address him by his last name, and grinned. "Sure!" he replied, and registered the bus – pavement outside – slowing down, and retracted his hand as the bus came to a shuddering, juddering standstill and people leant forward in their seats, the occasional arm thrust out to brace against sore chests or heads or noses from hitting into something or someone else. He pushed himself to his feet. "This is our stop, babe! Look life-like! Playtime's over!" He fixed a momentarily appreciative gaze to her bosom and snickered to himself.

* * *

If Kyle hadn't been so smug at the speediness and swiftness of the operation – a success – he'd probably have figured that she'd try for retribution for his little game on the bus earlier in the day.

She was much too proud to lag him in, that much he knew – and it worried him – but she was also loud and violently hurtful when she felt threatened, or humiliated, and he'd certainly humiliated her today.

As he neared the elevator and hit the button, he could not relax to wait for the elevator. His thoughts turned from the successful operation to his uncharacteristic behaviour, and he grew troubled. Was it a sign of things to come? He could not help but force down a barely suppressed shudder at the thought. He had no memory of his past, or his past self, prior to his coming to work for the police department as a detective. And the stint he'd thrown on the bus – and his lack of control over it, whatsoever – had frightened him deeply.

They'd been undercover, so he could chalk it up to working the ruse, if his behaviour was brought into question, but _he_ knew that that was not what it had been – it had not been a ruse – and this frightened him.

What would happen if that sort of behaviour became a regular occurrence? What would happen if he had no control over it? Would he be able to handle turning into the sort of individual he despised? Would he be able to handle hurting his partner again?

He felt tears building in his eyes, and pushed them down. He didn't want to cry too, on top of everything else! Not here, where someone he knew – someone he worked with – might see him!

The elevator arrived and he stepped into it, thankful that he was alone, at least, for a short while, and attempted to empty his mind on the ride down to the underground parking lot.

The moment he'd stepped from the elevator – glad to be headed home – and crossed the road, past several rows of vehicles, and finally come to his own car, she pushed herself away from his car, which she'd been standing leant against, and launched at him and backed him, painfully, in the side of the black van he'd parked beside, but instead of opening his eyes and seeing Lolly's angry face, he found himself faced with something else instead.

_"What's wrong with, Allie?" the boy, a six-year-old, asked._

_Allie was an eight-year-old girl, and was lying in a hospital bed with green linen, seemingly asleep._

_"Come to me," a soft voice spoke abruptly, and the boy turned around to face another, older, boy. This boy was in his early teens, perhaps twelve years old. "Come into my arms," the teenager soothed, holding out his arms, and the younger boy finally understood._

_Allie was sick. Very sick._

_The boy didn't want any stupid hug, but the older boy kept his gaze trained on his face – he had awfully blue eyes – and he felt himself convinced against his will, and he felt the older boy's arms come around him, and he couldn't breathe, but he didn't say so._

_"It never should have been Alicia," the older boy spoke. "That was my mistake. I was careless, slack. If I'd been better, it would have been me instead. She never should have been put in that position. But I'll fix it, Kyle, I promise I'll fix it. Alicia's gonna get better, I promise. And then it'll be just as if nothing ever was wrong. I promise it."_

_"Alex!" a sharp voice commanded the older boy's attention._

_Alex stepped away from the younger boy harshly and spun to face the voice, muttering under his breath as he did, "Savages!"_

_"What was that, Alex?" the bearer of the voice, a sharply dressed man, dressed entirely in black, save for a small, white cross pinned to his jacket, asked._

_"Reporting to attention, sir!" Alex mocked, and straightened and saluted, grinning._

_The man made a face, disapproving._

_The younger boy – Kyle – edged forward to speak._

_Alex's eyes flashed. "Has the littlest savage something to say?" he mocked. He laughed and growled. "Stay away from my woman!"_

_A doctor and several nurses approached, but Alex, with his back to them, was oblivious to them._

_He spun abruptly and cackled. "THE LOT OF YOU! CIRCUS FREAKS! SHE'S MINE! YOU'LL NEVER HAVE HER! ALL MINE!" He laughed again, as the nurses moved forward and took hold of him. "HASTEN SAVAGES, THE CIRCUS MASTER BECKONS, AND YOU JUMP! BUT NOT I! I, WHO AM NO SAVAGE, BUT HUMAN! I, THE ONE TRUE HUMAN!" He tossed a glance behind him, and winked at the younger boy. "SAVAGES! FILTHY SAVAGES! A TROUPE OF SAVAGES, AN INFESTATION! AM I BUT DEIGNED TO A LANGUID FATE? TO DIE BY MEANS OF SAVAGE DREAMS, AND SAVAGE MEANS, AND FAMILIES, AND CAFES – CAFES! – AND MONKEYS! YOU'LL NOT TAKE ME ALIVE!" The nurses held him fast as the doctor inserted a syringe and injected him. "BANANAS, SAVAGES! FROOTLOOPS! JUMP! DANCE! IT'S ALL YOU SAVAGES KNOW HOW TO DO! KNEEL BEFORE MY QUEEN, SAVAGES! THE QUEEN COMMANDS RESPECT, REVERENCE! OBEY, OR DIE! I SHALL DEFEND HER TO THE DEATH! MY QUEEN, WHY DO YOU HASTEN FROM ME SO?" His eyes rolled in his head. "Squash thems, pesky lil bugs! Squashs thems now!" He started to slur. "Hurry, child, sneaky, cheeky rascals you – bugs the Queen abhors!" He finally stopped struggling, out cold._

Kyle blinked several times, and his vision refocussed and he saw Lolly, frowning, standing less than a pace from him, and eyeing him with a very strange look.

He reached out a hand and gripped her shoulder loosely, stumbling away from the van and forward toward his partner.

She stepped closer suddenly and caught him before his hand slipped from her shoulder and he collapsed. "Name it!" he heard her angry – but worried – growl. "What have you taken, Harper? And fucking why?"

Distantly, he started to smile – Lolly never swore – before he lost consciousness completely.

* * *

He woke to a dark bruise below his eye and another kind of a headache, and found that he was in a car. Lolly's car?

He struggled to sit up straighter, and noticed that the car he was in was parked outside of a hospital, lights bright in the dark of the night.

"Your breathing was fine, so I figured I'd spare you the humiliation for when it was really necessary," Lolly's voice spoke, from the driver's side of the car, and he turned, wincing, to see Lolly seated beside him, a living shadow. "Like, say, on a bus!" Lolly snorted.

"Thanks," Kyle managed to mutter. He could not see the bruise, but he didn't need to – he could _feel_ it!

"Now that you're better," Lolly began.

"Alive," Kyle grumbled.

"I guess I should dump you in the gutter and make a speedy getaway!" she finished, entirely humourless.

Kyle laughed shortly, the sound cut shorter by the sharp, penetrating pain in his head. "Lolly," he rasped, suddenly finding his throat dry and scratchy, "I'm sorry. I don't know what got a hold of me."

Lolly laughed harshly, and he heard the seat creak as she shifted, but did not take his eyes from the windshield because of the pain in his head.

Lolly's face appeared in his vision, blocking out the windshield and dashboard, and then Lolly's shoulders, and the rest of Lolly's body, as she manoeuvred herself over him, and settled, a leg to either side of him, straddling his lap.

"What are you doing?" he asked, far too tired and pained to sound very annoyed.

"Honey, sugar?" Lolly asked, smiling.

Kyle frowned, and tried to back away from her, and found that there was nowhere for him _to_ back away. "Lolly, what are you doing?" he asked, confused, but trying his best not to let it come through it in his voice.

Lolly leant forward so that, in the darkness, he could see the gleam in her eyes, the bright spark of something dangerous, untrustworthy.

"Oh, no, Lolly!" he told her. "This is not gonna happen! You are not gonna do this, and I am not gonna let you!"

If she was trying to coerce him into having sex with her for some cheap revenge trick – to report him to their superiors, or to pin the blame on him – he was not going to have any part in it! He put his hands out to allow some distance between them, to halt her advances, and she dropped her hands into his lap.

"Lolly, please stop this!" he moaned roughly, suddenly hating that his throat was so dry.

Lolly ignored him and kneaded her hands against his groin.

"Lolly, I'm asking you to stop this now!" he told her, temper rising.

"You owe me, Harper!" Lolly growled, eyes flashing menacingly. "So shut your mouth and pay up!"

"Lolly, please!"

"Oh, fuck you!" Lolly hissed, and unzipped his pants.

Kyle frowned at the soreness of his arm, and, if it had been day, or brighter, he would have noticed a bruise. _What the Hell?_ he thought, his head pounding some more, and felt suddenly sick.

* * *

Kyle moaned as Lolly gasped, opening and closing her mouth at odd moments, as though doused with icy water, or suddenly naked in a windstorm, the thought of which Kyle did not really want to contemplate… at least, not really… not much…

"You're going about this all wrong!" he growled, growing impatient, and abruptly warming to the idea of their extracurricular liaison, and slipped one hand into her underwear, and another around her bottom. "You don't owe me anything, Lolly. This is about what I owe you, not what you owe me," he told her, sliding a finger inside her.

But in the end, they did end up at a motel, and his head still hurt.

* * *

"What did you give me?" he croaked, examining the bruise and pinprick in his arm in the light.

Lolly didn't smile. "Nothing," she said. "I gave you nothing."

Kyle coughed. He really needed some water. "I don't understand," he rasped. "What is the point of that?"

"That is exactly the point!" Lolly replied.

He struggled to sit up, head pounding. "Lolly, I don't remember things so well, things from before, from the past! I've told you that before!"

Lolly glanced at him, sitting on the side of the bed with her back half to him. "I know."

"What are you doing, Lolly?" Kyle asked, impossibly tired.

"He likes me," Lolly told him.

Kyle choked, though he'd attempted a laugh. "Lolly, no! He isn't… safe!"

"How would you know?" Lolly asked, turning away from him once more. "You can't remember him!"

Kyle coughed again. "He's just pretending to like you, Lolly, if that's what you're calling it now! He has some hidden agenda, and he's pretending to like you so he can draw nearer to his fucking agenda, and I bet he won't care about hurting you in the process!"

Lolly hunched forward. To slip a sock or a shoe on, Kyle supposed. "You're wrong," Lolly told him. "He told me I was his queen."

"What?" Kyle choked.

"He told me he loved me, that he'd been born just to love me, and I to love him, that nobody could separate us if we loved each other!" Lolly went on.

"_He_ told you?"

Lolly became very still. "Yes, he told me," she said quietly. "He sounds a lot like you, but I knew it wasn't you."

Kyle pushed himself into a sitting position and counted the black spots and patches in front of his vision. "Lolly, I care… about you, and I'm telling you this as someone who cares about you. You can't trust him!"

Lolly laughed, the sound harsh and grating. "Go to Hell, Harper!"

"I won't let him have you!" Kyle promised. "I won't let him win!"

Lolly finished tying her shoe lace and turned to face him. "You may not have any choice," she told him.

Kyle gazed at her, trying to see her properly. "What has he done to you?" he asked, suddenly afraid.

Lolly laughed. "What hasn't he?"

* * *

_Allie coughed and sat up, pain evident on her face. "Which one of you did it?" she demanded, pale and angry._

_"It's gonna be alright now, Alicia," Alex assured her. "You're gonna be fine now. You're not gonna be sick anymore."_

_Allie turned wide eyes on Kyle – Had he had any part in this? – and her eyes abruptly filled with tears that slid down her face in unstoppable torrents._

_Alex quickly turned away from her, so that he wouldn't see her crying, or he could lie and say he hadn't, but Kyle continued staring at her, as wide-eyed as herself._

_When Kyle was taken out, and it was only Allie and Alex alone, she tried to stopper up her tears and glare at Alex. "I hate you!" she told him, horribly precisely. "I will hate you, always."_

_Alex glanced up from the floor. "That's okay," he said. "I don't hate you."_

_Allie laughed, disgusted. "This thing you have done was a mistake," she hissed. "You are a mistake! Fuck off and leave me to die, you motherfucking sociopath, and when I'm dead, you'll have your Queen, and you can do with this body what you will! FUCK OFF!"_

_Alex stepped closer to her bed and took hold of her flailing arms, which had attempted unsuccessfully to hurt him. "You're like my sister, Allie," he told her. "I love you. I'd never allow you to leave… for such squalid, petty reasons. I'll always make you better. Don't you see, you and Kyle are the only ones keeping me _this_. You make me better. Both of you. But one day I am going to change. I'm sick, Allie. I'm very sick. I only hope that you will have found a home… away from here… before that time comes. You can't make me not love you. I'm to love all I can, as much as I can, until I no longer care for love. Doctor's orders."_

* * *

_He did not know it if was the shock – if he could even feel shock – she was dead, after all. Dead, rotting corpse, the body dumped unceremoniously._

_Once, he'd dreamed of all of the little crawly things that had come to feast upon her rotting corpse, but then he'd just missed her, quivering._

_She'd always done that nicely: fear!_

_He did miss her, he conceded. And he was so fucking mad at her fruitcake boyfriend for that, for taking her away from him! They could have called it even, gone 50/50, but he'd wanted more than a bit, he'd wanted all of her, and when she'd finally pissed him off enough – when she'd actually _showed_ some guts – he'd murdered her._

_He never would have killed her, Kyle thought disgustedly. He might have played with her a bit, but he never would have hurt her _that way_!_

_He couldn't think about her lying dead somewhere, it hurt his stomach. She'd been so fucking wonderful! He'd needed to possess her! He'd needed to make her his own! If only she'd seen that, if only she'd understood that!_

_But her fruitcake boyfriend had!_

_So Kyle didn't dream of Lin. He couldn't think about her name, either! Even that was too fucking God damned perfect!_

_So he dreamed of the day he'd finally exact his revenge on that fucking fruitcake boyfriend of hers!_

_He'd never actually hurt the kid, he told himself. It was priceless! Fucking priceless! It reminded him too much of her to hurt, reminded him too much of her mother in all the good ways, except she wasn't, she wasn't her mother, and it hurt every single time he laid eyes on her! It hurt because she wasn't her mother, and she never would be! Her mother was dead – and she always would be!_

_At first, he thought he'd gone because he'd need to know if he had hurt, if he was hurting the kid! It pissed him off when people hit kids around! But then he realised what had really made him go was that he couldn't quite figure out why the fruitcake had invited him _for Christmas dinner_ at all! He'd never have invited the fuck anywhere near into his home – if he'd had a home!_

_Which was another thing that pissed him off! The fruitcake had been handed a house, and the girl – his girl, she'd always been his girl first – and what had he been given? Fucking nothing! So he'd had to see the fruitcake's home from inside, see if the lunatic kept pictures of the girlfriend he'd murdered._

_The child – 4-year-old – was so fucking quiet! The sort of child he'd have been rapt to have, if he ever decided to have a fucking child! The thought alone almost made him laugh. Who in the fuck would he have a child with? Rotting corpses didn't count!_

_He almost laughed again. Just to fucking think, to fucking think that he was only _now_ contemplating something that should have been _so fucking apparent_ to him! Of course, there would never be anyone else he would ever want a child with! Perhaps there never could be again! And it was all thanks to that fucking fruitcake sitting across the table from him, talking to the child in a low voice, the sort of voice that screams _What the fuck, man?

_And that was when Kyle realised it, and remembered how the young man had been standing there in front of him, shaking from head to toe and trying not to cry, trying so hard not to cry, and wasn't that just laughable! As though he was more scared of the gun in his own hand, than anything Kyle could ever do, with or without the gun! But it hadn't been himself he had been defending, Kyle remembered – and he was the elder – so he'd just had to suck it in, and make like he wasn't frightened in the least, except both he and Kyle had known that he was._

_If the almost constant trembling, and the heaving of his chest – they hadn't even really thrown any good punches – hadn't given it away, it had been in his eyes, Kyle thought. Which was what started him thinking about how fucking beautiful his eyes were – and those fucking beautiful eyelashes – and how much he'd wanted to storm up to him and take the stupid gun off him – he shouldn't have been playing with it if he couldn't even hold it without shaking so much, though his grip had been almost too still, as though he'd been putting all of his effort into that one task, into keeping that gun steady and on target, and had forgotten that the eyes really were the window to the soul – and, God damn him for being so fucked up, but he'd just wanted to fucking kiss him, and that almost scared him more than he could say!_

_But what had scared the fruitcake had been when his girlfriend had walked around the corner and had seen him holding that gun! He'd been so frightened, he hadn't even _tried_ to turn around, he hadn't even tried to face her and explain. But Kyle had gotten there first – he'd stridden right past the fruitcake plus gun in hand – and had strolled on up to Lin – he shuddered at the thought of her name – and he'd seen the _fear_ in her eyes! And this time it was not because of him – it was _for_ him! She'd been afraid for him! Afraid that her fruitcake boyfriend would shoot him! He'd wanted to laugh in her face and tell her that the little fucker would never even dare, but instead he'd settled for a song, and they'd both known what it had meant. With a temper like that, was she really safe? Was their child really safe? If only he'd actually believed it himself, and had not just been winding her up!_

_So it was fairly fucking strange – even for him – that he wanted to kiss the fucking fruitcake, though he was thankful that the kid was there._

_It wasn't until later – much later – that he'd realised why he'd wanted to kiss Lyle. He supposed he'd probably realised exactly why he did when he woke up in Med Space and found that the fucking little creep – and he was well within his rights labelling him 'little,' there was a year between them, and Kyle wasn't the younger of them – sitting in his room, holding his _fucking hand_, which – ordinarily – probably would have had him screaming for a nurse, or a fucking doctor – if he didn't hate them all so fucking much – but the freak was asleep, and Kyle resigned to fixing him with a steady glare, willing him to wake up so they could start a yelling match, and then he'd be_ asked_, if not told, to fucking leave, and then he would leave._

_He realised then that he'd never actually seen the little creep asleep before, because he didn't sleep so well, if the involuntary little spasms and trembling was anything to go by, or the smile-inducing flinch he'd given when Kyle had moved his free hand – the one that was not being held – across the disgusting green blanket to touch one of his hands._

_The reason he'd wanted so badly to kiss Lyle, Kyle realised, was because he could, because Lyle was someone who he could hold something over, because someone – somewhere – had done it before, and had gotten away with it, and look what Lyle had gotten away with? Kyle liked power, and he liked to be able to say he was in charge, but even he had to admit, the thought of kissing the fruitcake was pretty damn gross!_

_But didn't stop him from doing just that, the next time he was presented with the chance, and the lunatic had been confined to Med Space for some reason or other – Kyle couldn't care less why – and was safely medicated and asleep._

_Kyle swiped the chart quickly and scanned down the list of medications and dosages administered – frowned at the sedative used – and supposed the fruitcake really was on lunatic pills, and couldn't be prescribed anything other due to the risk of a clash._

_He replaced the chart and stepped around the end of the bed. Even sedated, Lyle didn't sleep much better. Kyle grinned._

_And leant down and kissed Lyle._

_And resolved to never do so again._

_It was a dangerous thing, he decided, the light. Sometimes it made you see what you didn't want to see, and other times it stopped you from seeing what you wanted to see, or didn't want to see._

_It wasn't that he was an overly superstitious person, but he suddenly felt strange, and he realised that they'd met before, a long time before Lyle had been anything more than a thing that functioned at a purely task-orientated level, a thing without feelings or thoughts, but a thing with _just_ something, a thing that Kyle owed, for making feeling bearable when it had been unbearable._

_Kyle shivered, just to think of that, just to think of that time, and hurried to straighten, and wiped the tear that had fallen onto Lyle's cheek away, and realised, that, more than anything, this new thing needed protection, because it could not – would not – protect itself, because it had not been made to, and, as hard as this new thing strived, as much as it found fault with its actions, it could not fight what it had been made first to not fight – just the same way Kyle could not fight what he had been made into._

_He would not speak of it again, Kyle decided, but first he had to do something about _this_, this needing something that he would not allow himself._

_He did not particularly care for it, but he knew he needed to get it out of his system – and the Hell away from him._

* * *

_He found Alex frowning in his sleep, muttering to himself about someone called the Emperor, in Commons, on SL-11, and shook him awake roughly._

_"I need to talk to you," he told Alex in a low voice, and dragged him by the arm up off the couch and to his feet, and across the room, and into a side passage and some way along the passage, until he came to a short entryway leading to a maintenance room which was locked._

_"What's the matter," Alex asked sleepily, running his words together, "the dining hall run out of apple pie or something?"_

_Kyle ignored him and backed him up against the wall with the most shadow and kissed him, and was surprised when Alex woke up enough to push him away from him violently, but only grinned and pushed him back up against the wall with a little more force and kissed him again._

_Finally managing to separate himself from him, Alex made a face. "Kyle, come on, stop playing games!" he complained._

_"Shut up and let me fucking finish, okay?" Kyle growled, and fixed him with a nasty glare, and slipped his own leg between Alex's legs so that they could be closer._

_Alex stared at the wall opposite them – the wall he was not pressed up against – and listened to Kyle's hurried jigsaw breathing. He was sure, if he tried, that he could emulate it, that he could Simulate it, even though he'd feel extremely stupid, so that was what he did._

_And Kyle pretended that he didn't hear, each time that he started the rhythm again, hoping to get it _just_ that fraction more accurate, or maybe he just didn't hear._

* * *

Kyle woke abruptly and lurched out of the motel bed and toward the bathroom and threw up in the toilet, and wondered if the light would wake Lolly, and if he'd chance shutting the bathroom door.

* * *

Kyle sat opposite Lolly in the cramped motel restaurant/diner and sipped his coffee, the light streaming in through the large glass windows stinging his eyes horribly.

Up until yesterday, the most he'd remembered about his past was a bright white light, always a bright white light, which had made him think that possibly he'd been abducted by aliens, or possibly he was very seriously mentally ill, or possibly he'd just been a drug user or addict.

What he remembered now, the bits and pieces and flashes, made him want to do whatever it was he'd done in the first place to forget again.

He'd didn't feel at all like eating, or like drinking his coffee, but Lolly was sitting across from him, eating her own breakfast the way she always did – as though she were starving, though she was in no way underweight, just hungry, always very hungry – and he told himself that he could do better than that – for Lolly's sake.

He was sure that there was something very wrong with her, but if he didn't pull it together, he couldn't help her.

* * *

**I can't write Kyle very well, he always ends up turning into *whispers quietly* 'zoid! Sorry, Kyle!**

**Thanks for reading, anyway.**


End file.
